The process starts: I note an idea and, when it’s a good one, everything I do kicks the concept around. Listening to podcasts on the bus to UC Berkeley’s J-school where I’m a Master of Journalism candidate. Conversing with the little kids I’ve nannied about their future careers as teachers, as morticians (really, this is what one wants to become). Observing as my husband tenderly cares for his cacti and other plants. The idea is shaped and reshaped in my mind, a snag to be picked at and pulled apart, added to and amended as I encounter my daily life.

It sticks with me until I’m forced to get it out onto the page, to start digesting it – rearranging the words, doing research and reading on the subject, and editing for continuity, for readability.